Day Two
Hime and I got to a late start on Saturday. Again, we had to take the train from Islington to Backbay and then cut through Copley Plaza. The first thing that needed to be done was to locate a proper version of Saturday's schedule. So, we headed over to the press room. No schedule. Then we ran over to the registration desks to see if they had anything. No schedule. Finally, we ran to the information booth at the convention center. Lo and behold, we had found our schedule.

Since there was nothing we really wanted to see at this point, we headed over to the video game room in the Sheraton. It was a neat little setup; think of a grand dining room where all the tables have television sets and videogame systems ranging from Xbox 360 to Nintendo DS to Nintendo 64. As you can imagine, the main games being served were fighting games, though there was a DDR machine (or two) somewhere in the back, but I wasn't going to attempt that… not with people looking, anyway.

Across from the video game room, there was the manga library. Though I never actually sat in one, I do remember taking a glimpse of the one at Anime Boston 2004. By comparison, this year's was much larger and contained a wider selection of new and old manga. I can see how this would be a great way for people to take a load off after spending a day running around a convention center.

Noon came and we headed to one of the panels for Anime Trivia. It was held in the same room as the Media Blasters and Tokyopop panels, so we didn't have much difficulty tracking it down. Once we got comfortable, the games began. The event was held in two parts. For the first part, four players came to the front and were asked different anime-related questions. The one who raised his hand first got to answer. If he gets the answer right, he gets a point. The one with the most... well, you get the idea.

Half the time, I was shaking my head. At one point, they went into a lightning round where the players had to write down as many anime as they could that did not feature any cross-dressers in the span of one minute. After that minute was up, the players read their lists one at a time, and the judges would have to say yay or nay. I was shocked that two players put down Yu Yu Hakusho and Rurouni Kenshin as anime without cross-dressers… and the judges gave them points! Where's the justice?

For the second part, two teams of three people each were called up to answer a set of Jeopardy!-style questions. Here, if no one knew the answers, then the audience could yell them out. Hime got very upset at one point. The question was: who is the highest paid female author in Japan? After some deliberation, one of the young cosplaying contestants answered: who is the woman who writes Inuyasha?

Hime, frothing at the mouth, yelled, "Rumiko Takahashi, you noob!"

Yeah. Wow.

There was also a round where the contestants had to guess songs. Most of these melodies were familiar: Get Along from Slayers, Logos Naki World from Hellsing, Real Folk Blues from Cowboy Bebop, etc. Again, the audience could answer if the contestants couldn't (which happened frequently). I got For the Love of Life from Monster, and Hime got that creepy opening to Ghost in the Shell II: Innocence. However, the judge claimed it was the first Ghost in the Shell. So, before Hime could launch a chair at the judges for the wrong call, I grabbed her and we ran out at 1:00 pm.

After some deliberation as to what to do next, we walked over to a random panel room. This one just so happened to be a discussion with Richard Epcar and Mary Elizabeth McGlynn (the English voice actors for Batau and Kusanagi, respectively, from Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex). When we walked in, the panel was at the tail-end of Q&A. It was actually kind of eerie to hear how closely their voices sound like their dubbed personas.

At 1:30 pm the panel was over, so Hime and I ran out and headed towards the elevator. And just as we stepped in, guess who else joined us? Mr. Epcar and Ms. McGlynn. Here we were, two innocent anime fans caught in an elevator with a couple of Guests of Honor. I would have made conversation, but to be honest they intimidated me with their stature (Epcar is a very tall man). The elevator (strangely) dumped us right in the dealers room. This was actually part of a master plan Hime and I had going. We ran over to a table we noted back on Friday; it was selling posters, cels and prints from various old-school series. Our plan was to purchase one that featured an anime in which Shimamoto Sumi starred. When her autograph session came about, we would get it signed by her for one of our friends, Sousuke (who happens to be a big Shimamoto fan).

After purchasing a proper poster, we headed back up to the ADV panel. Hopefully, this time they would actually mention some licenses. We got in at 1:40 pm, which was 10 minutes into showing a subtitled episode of Jinki: Extend, one of the new licenses. I know I normally reserve judgment on series until after I watch them, but I was a bit underwhelmed by this episode. Maybe I'll watch it when ADV releases it later this year.

Right after the episode was over, Dave Williams and Matt Greenfield took the stage to answer questions. They took this time to talk about the upcoming Evangelion 10th anniversary box coming out. For those who are interested (I sure wasn't), the set will go for somewhere around $200 USD and will contain the platinum edition DVDs and an EVA jacket, which got some ooh's and ah's from the crowd. Other interesting notes: ADV will release the Elfen Lied OVA at some point. However, seeing as how that OVA is only 22 minutes in length, they're trying to figure out the best way to market it. Battle Angel was brought up by a fan who wanted to know whether it will be re-released on DVD. Williams replied that James Cameron (who will be helming the upcoming film) bought all the rights to anything Battle Angel-related.

One fan asked about how ADV might deal with a potential bankruptcy scenario; the question was sparked by rumors about Central Park Media apparently filing for bankruptcy. Both Williams and Greenfield mentioned that ADV has been spending years on creative consolidation to make sure that their company will not go belly-up. They did mention about the change in the market, and how like other anime companies, they'll wait to see how this Blu-Ray/HD-DVD battle plays out before lunging for a format.

Also, the two of them took some time to give a brief overview of what it takes to actually go out and license a series. Mentioning that the "anime market is not doing so well in Japan, with studios going bankrupt all the time" and animation productions often switching hands so many times that it becomes hard to secure rights. Going so far as to mention that the negatives for one old-school anime (the title escapes me) were actually found in a bank vault.

There was also mention of Shinkai Mokoto producing a new anime. Seeing as how ADV has licensed and released all of Shinkai's works, a license announcement in the near-future is not unlikely. The nature of this work-in-progress has yet to be revealed. The funniest question I heard was from a fan asking if ADV was going to pick up Full Metal Panic! The Second Raid. Williams mentioned that Kadokawa (the producer) was looking into releasing it themselves, and that ADV didn't have the rights. The reason why I find this funny is because right after this was the Funimation panel. And one of the titles they announced was... you guessed it... Full Metal Panic! The Second Raid.

Finally, someone asked about Bubblegum Crisis: 2041, or more accurately, what happened to it? Greenfield and Williams compared it, rather comically, to Indiana Jones 4; a project everyone wants to do, but one no one has the time for. That got a rile out of everyone. The panel ended at 2:32 pm, so Hime and I went down to Newbury Street for lunch. We stopped by at a tiny bistro that was also a book store. Now that is what I call quaint.

At 4:00 pm, we headed back to the convention center. Seeing as how we had time to kill, we wandered around for a little bit and found our way back into the panel room we were at before. This time, voice actors Steven J. Blum (Spike from Cowboy Bebop, Roger Smith from Big O, Mugen from Samurai Champloo, among others) and Vic Mignogna (Hikaru from Macross, Ed from Fullmetal Alchemist, Shougo from Megazone 23, etc.) were seated in front of a very large crowd. This was probably my favorite panel at the con. I don't normally watch my anime dubbed, but I was familiar with both of these actors. At several times, audience members asked the pair to speak lines from their respective shows. Blum got a huge round of applause for uttering one line from Cowboy Bebop: "bang." Mignogna also got an equally large reception when he was asked to sing a few lines from the English version of one of the Fullmetal Alchemist songs.

At one point, one of the audience members asked if Blum and Mignogna would (I am not making this up) like to talk to his friend… on his cell phone. Without any hesitation, they asked for the phone, but as luck would have it, the friend wasn't there. Things culminated when Mignogna offered to show the audience a preview of Fullmetal Alchemist: The Conquerer of Shambala. Needless to say, the audience was stoked. The panel ended at 5:30 pm, so Hime and I went out to line up for the autograph signing with Shimamoto Sumi.

I don't remember if I stated this before, but Hime and I are huge Shimamoto fans. This was more than worth the wait. Most of the people in line either had their programs (which contained an autograph section in the back) or copies of Nausicaä (Shimamoto voiced the title character) for her to sign. One woman had a beautifully framed picture of the "Princess of the Valley of the Wind." I would have used my press pass to bypass the line, but something tells me it would have been in bad taste.

Eventually, we got to the front of the line, so Hime and I took out our pieces of fandom. Hime had the poster we got for Sousuke. When Shimamoto saw it, she let out an exclamation of, "Wow! Sugoi!" The poster in question was none other than Giant Robo in which she voiced Gin Rei. Hime told her that she was a Giant Robo and Maison Ikkoku (in which Shimamoto voiced Kiyoko) fan. Apparently, no one had approached her with anything Gin Rei-related that day. After that, she signed my Maison Ikkoku box set, and Hime, Shimamoto and myself got our picture taken. That's one for the ages, folks.

It was around 6:15 pm at this point, so we went over to the fan parody panel. The panel was hosted by the trio of Mike, Scott and Jon of NoN.D.E. Fanfilms. The studio was responsible for such fan parodies as This is Otakudom and S.T.E.A.M. the Movie; the latter Hime and I saw last year at Otakon 2005. For much of the panel, they talked about what it takes to produce a fan parody. It actually sounded like a lot more work than I could imagine. I mean, all the mention of computer programs, voice-acting schedules, etc., I really have to tip my hat to these guys. Imagine taking scenes from all sorts of anime (from Ranma ½ to Rurouni Kenshin to Dragonball Z), edit all the scenes so that they match seamlessly, voice over previously recorded dialogue, replace the music and still find room for in-jokes and a plot. Yeah, that much work. Oh yeah, and the final product was 85 minutes long.

After explaining several of the in-jokes (the title is actually a long-running joke from Ninja High School), the panel came to an end at 8:00 pm. We would have stayed for the next panel, which was Applegeeks, but my old age was already getting to me. So, we headed home for the night.

Day 3
Sunday was not going to be a big day by any stretch of the imagination. Due to obligations and schedules, I had to be out of Boston by 2:30 pm in the afternoon. But even then, Hime and I still managed to have a bit of fun.

On the subway ride into Boston, we came across some cosplayers masquerading as the cast of Howl's Moving Castle. Naturally, I had Hime pose in a picture with them. That's one of the best things about conventions: running into obvious anime fans in places you normally would not expect. When we got to the convention center, our first stop was (what else?) the dealers room. It was here, that in a rare act of kindness, I purchased a plushie llama for Hime. The strange thing about this was that last year, at Otakon 2005, I purchased a desert fox plushie for her in the dealers room. Well, it turned out that the merchant of this fine llama was the exact same plushie-peddler! It really is a small otaku world after all.

While we were there, I was able to hunt down some additional volumes to my favorite samurai comics: being Lone Wolf and Cub and Usagi Yojimbo. One of the dealers tried to coax me into buying the Usagi Yojimbo role playing game, but I was not going to give in to her despicable tactics. There was also a set of One Piece and Macross posters I wanted to buy, but they were going for prices I could not have dealt with without having to sacrifice my ride home. Instead, I bought a Zeta Gundam model kit and closed my wallet for good.

After that, Hime and I wandered through the artists alley once more. The Apple Geeks crew was giving away free sketches, but the crowd gathered and I was growing weary. We left the con at this point, seeing as how we normally don't stay for closing ceremonies anyway, and headed to the train station. 2:30 pm came and so did the Amtrak to New York. Hime and I embraced, and then we parted ways… for the time being. I waved to Hime as the train slowly picked up steam, and kept waving even when I couldn't see her anymore. I'd see her soon, though. I'd see Anime Boston again, too, though not for another year. With a thousand thoughts, I leaned back, plugged in my laptop, and watched a couple of episodes of One Piece all the way to Penn Station.

I was actually really surprised by Anime Boston's growth after only two years. True, the convention has a way to go before it can stand toe-to-toe with Otakon or Anime Expo, though it was a pleasant and welcoming adventure for what it was. The biggest factor that made this con as fun as it was had to be Hime. Many people go to conventions without any accomplices or plan-of-attack. She proved to me, yet again, that whether it's a platoon of rabid otaku or a single, fun-loving fan, the overall fun and enjoyment you have at a con is affected by the companions you take. And I will never forget Anime Boston 2006 for years to come.

Return to Anime Boston 2006: Part I...